"We carried him to our fire and brought him round, and did all we could for him for three weeks; then he died. He told us he had been one of a party of six who had been prospecting in the hills west of the Lower Gila. One of them had learned, from an Indian he had helped in some way, of a place where the bed of a stream was full of gold. They found it; but the next morning they were attacked by the Apaches, who had, I expect, been following them all the time. Two of them were killed at once, the others got upon their horses and rode for it. Three of them were shot down, but this man was well mounted and got off, though they chased him for three days. He lost his way; his horse fell dead, but he struggled on until he saw the smoke of our fire and made us out to be whites.
"Before he died he told us how the place could be found. He said there was no doubt about the gold, and he had three or four nuggets in his pockets, weighing two or three pounds each. He said he had had lots of bigger ones, but had chucked them all away to lighten his horse. Well, it is a long journey. It will take us all a month, I reckon, to get there. We cannot go straight—the Apaches would have us to a certainty—but must go north into the Moquis country, and then down again from that side. We have been minded to try it ever since, but luck has been bad with us, and, besides, two men wouldn't be enough for such a journey.
"It ain't every one Sim and I would care about going with, but we have both taken a fancy to you. We saw you stand up straight before that crowd of Mexicans; besides, we know it wants good grit for that cow-boy life. Now this is the offer we make. We have got two horses, and we can buy two pack-horses, but we can't go further than that. You have got two out-and-out horses; we saw you ride in yesterday afternoon. You will want another pack-horse, and you will have to provide the outfit: say two bags of flour, two sides of bacon, ten pounds of tea, and a couple of gallons of spirits; then there will be sugar and some other things.
"We shall also want a small tent. Now if you like to join us on these terms you can. There is plenty of gold for us all. But mind you, it will be no child's play. The journey from the Moquis country there will be terrible; and there is the chance, and a pretty big chance it is, I tell you, of a fight with the Red-skins. We may never find the place. We have got pretty good indications, but it is not an easy matter to find a place among those mountains. Still, there it is. If you get there and back you will each have a horse-load of gold; if you don't you will leave your bones there. What do you say to it?"
Hugh looked at Royce. "I reckon we kin take our chances if you kin," the latter said. "At any rate, mates, you will find as we can take our share in whatever comes."
"Then that is agreed," the doctor said. "Now about preparations. It will never do for you to be buying the things here; for if we were seen to start off together we should be followed, sure enough; it would be guessed at once we had told you of something good. We must not be seen together again. We will get our pack-horses and load up, and go as if we were undertaking a job on our own account, and camp up somewhere twenty miles away, and stop there a week. After we have gone you can get your outfit and move off and join us. Sim and I have been talking over whether it will be a good thing to take José—that is the man here—with us, instead of buying baggage horses. He has got four beasts. He could ride one himself, and the other three, with the one you have, would make up the number. José can be trusted; besides, we should not tell him where we were going, but we should have to say it would be a long journey and a dangerous one. He is a widower, with one child, and these horses are his only possession, and I think he would want their value put down before he started, say seventy-five dollars a-piece for them and their saddles, that is three hundred dollars. You wouldn't buy them for less. So as far as money goes it would come to the same thing. You will get it back again if José and the animals come back; but if we all do come back, three hundred dollars would be nothing one way or the other. Then comes the point, would it be worth while to take him? There would be one more mouth to feed, but that does not go for much; there would be one more rifle in case we had to fight, and José has plenty of courage. I have seen him in a fix before now. He would look after the beasts and leave our hands free; and his pay would cost us nothing, for if we got there he would help us gather and wash the gold."
"What is the drawback then?" Hugh asked.
"The drawback is, that if we have to ride for it he might hinder us."
"There ain't much in that, doc.," Sim Howlett put in. "Our horses are pretty good though they ain't much to look at, but the horses our mates here have got would leave them standing, and I don't know that José's best is much slower than ours; besides, when you are working among those mountains speed goes for nothing. A horse accustomed to them would pick his way among the rocks faster'n a race-horse. Ef we are attacked there running won't be much good to us. Ef we get fairly out from the hills with the gold and the 'Paches are on our trail, why, we then must trust to cunning, and our mates here can ride clear away."
"We sha'n't do that, Sim," Hugh said. "If we throw in our lot with you we shall share it to the end, whatever it is."